Is New Orleans Trading Internet Access for Corporate Surveillance?

New Orleans (LA) is making an ambitious bid to deliver WiFi to the homes of its poorest residents. Using “smart,” electronic streetlights as nodes, it wants to establish a new citywide internet service, one that will compete with existing carriers like Cox and AT&T. The city intends to include a free tier for everyone who needs it, a group amounting to at least 16 percent of the population. But the plan is being met with skepticism from the left. Instead of using public funds, Mayor LaToya Cantrell (D-LA)'s administration is proposing that tech companies cover most of the cost, which will range from $50 million to $100 million upfront. In exchange, those companies would own the infrastructure and would use it for advertising and to collect data—which they would sell, in turn, to third parties. In a city that’s become uncommonly cynical about surveillance, it’s not taken for granted that this tradeoff would be worth it. New Orleans’s dilemma speaks to both the promise and the perils of smart-city technology.